Film Freak Centraltag:typepad.com,2003:weblog-999282957331064452015-06-07T19:48:56-05:00TypePadFocus (2015) - Blu-ray + DVD + Digital HDtag:typepad.com,2003:post-6a0168ea36d6b2970c01b7c79a5f47970b2015-06-07T19:48:56-05:002015-06-07T19:48:56-05:00**/**** Image A+ Sound A Extras C+ starring Will Smith, Margot Robbie, Rodrigo Santoro, Gerald McRaney written and directed by Glenn Ficarra & John Requa WATCH IN iTUNES by Walter Chaw The world's most polite heist/caper/con-man Charade thing, which feels it's finally time to continue that death trudge towards completion of a Matchstick Men trilogy, John Requa and Glenn Ficarra's Focus is a studiedly-inoffensive star vehicle for Will Smith that's interesting only because of Will Smith's casual attitude towards miscegenation. Easy to say that in 2015 a black guy with a white girl isn't that big a deal, but I still can't think of too many examples where a superstar like Smith is willing to repeatedly cast himself opposite a cross-racial leading lady. Smith is even a producer of Will Gluck's intriguing Annie, which, in addition to being a very strange bookend to the surveillance-state nightmare of The Dark Knight, features at its centre an interracial love story between characters played by Jamie Foxx and Rose Byrne. I'm spending a lot of time on this, because Focus, aside from the sexy shenanigans of Smith's expert con-man Nicky and his ingénue protégé Jess (Margot Robbie) and the fact of their race-mixing...Bill ChambersAfter the Sunset (2004) [New Line Platinum Series] - DVDtag:typepad.com,2003:post-6a0168ea36d6b2970c01a3fce26508970b2014-03-29T23:01:00-05:002014-03-29T19:22:24-05:00ZERO STARS/**** Image B+ Sound A- Extras B starring Pierce Brosnan, Salma Hayek, Woody Harrelson, Don Cheadle screenplay by Paul Zbyszewski and Craig Rosenberg directed by Brett Ratner by Walter Chaw Hard to know by their films whether Michael Bay or Brett Ratner is the bigger asshole, but when cold reaches a certain level it's just cold, so I'm comfortable calling it a draw. Ratner's latest, After the Sunset, is Trouble in Paradise by way of the Pierce Brosnan version of The Thomas Crown Affair: a joyless exercise in the sex-play heist genre featuring a plastic couple for whom, when they first met, it was grand larceny. Along the way, there's enough leering misogyny to satisfy a legion of folks either too young or too afraid of God to go rent some good old-fashioned, red-blooded porn. Audiences for this garbage choose instead to slake their venal lusts, to for a moment calm the roil of inadequacy and self-doubt at the public trough of screaming homophobia, queer gun-fondling, and enough women making bad decisions in front of a camera-wielding man to fill a "Girls Gone Wild" video. RUNNING TIME 98 minutes MPAA PG-13 ASPECT RATIO(S) 2.35:1 (16x9-enhanced) LANGUAGES English DD 5.1...Bill ChambersInside Man (2006) [Widescreen] + Thank You for Smoking (2006) [Widescreen] - DVDstag:typepad.com,2003:post-6a0168ea36d6b2970c01a3fcdc3651970b2014-03-23T23:01:00-05:002014-03-22T12:13:43-05:00INSIDE MAN ***/**** Image A Sound A- Extras B starring Denzel Washington, Clive Owen, Jodie Foster, Christopher Plummer screenplay by Russell Gewirtz directed by Spike Lee THANK YOU FOR SMOKING ***/**** Image B+ Sound B+ Extras B starring Aaron Eckhart, Maria Bello, Adam Brody, Sam Elliott screenplay by Jason Reitman, based on the novel by Christopher Buckley directed by Jason Reitman by Walter Chaw You make mistakes as a film critic sometimes and, unlike a lot of professions, when you flub, you do it for the record. I underestimated Spike Lee's 25th Hour badly upon its release a few years ago, misunderstanding it, fearing it, seeing it as a mediocre film when, in fact, subsequent viewings have revealed it as possibly Lee's tonal masterpiece. My inclination, then, is to overcompensate with Inside Man by offering it every benefit of the doubt beforehand, during, and now--by trying hard to overlook the first bad Jodie Foster performance I can remember as well as a mishandled denouement that stretches the picture past the point of recoil. But even with a jaundiced eye, Inside Man cements Lee as one of the few filmmakers with the brass ones to comment on the race schism, and...Bill ChambersRipley's Game (2002) - DVDtag:typepad.com,2003:post-6a0168ea36d6b2970c017d42f2853a970c2013-04-19T15:32:38-05:002013-04-19T15:32:38-05:00**** Image A Sound A starring John Malkovich, Dougray Scott, Ray Winstone, Lena Headey screenplay by Charles McKeown and Liliana Cavani, based on the novel by Patricia Highsmith directed by Liliana Cavani by Walter Chaw When I heard that The Night Porter auteur Liliana Cavani was adapting one of Patricia Highsmith's Mr. Ripley novels, I knew to expect something more in line with René Clément's brilliant Purple Noon than Anthony Minghella's lavishly simpering The Talented Mr. Ripley. What I didn't anticipate was that this film, which never received any sort of domestic theatrical distribution before being summarily dropped, supplement-free, onto the home video market, would be one of the best of its year--indeed, of its kind. Ripley's Game is doomed to the "direct-to-video" label and an ignominious eternity buried in the Blockbuster shelves for the occasional stunned bemusement of the well traveled and the John Malkovich fetishist--it languishes there while over-masticated tripe like The Alamo finds its way to thousands of screens, its lingering impact to remind again that the slippery slope in Hollywood's distribution game just got steeper. Ripley's Game would have looked great on the big screen--and some genius robbed us of the opportunity to see it that...Bill ChambersDr. Seuss' How the Grinch Stole Christmas (2000) [Collector's Edition (Widescreen) + DVD Interactive Playset] - DVDstag:typepad.com,2003:post-6a0168ea36d6b2970c017c349514ad970b2012-12-13T17:38:03-05:002012-12-13T17:39:30-05:00*/**** Image A Sound A Extras B- Playset A- starring Jim Carrey, Jeffrey Tambor, Christine Baranski, Molly Shannon screenplay by Jeffrey Price & Peter S. Seaman, based on the book by Dr. Seuss directed by Ron Howard by Bill Chambers Dr. Seuss' How The Grinch Stole Christmas? More like Dr. Strangelove's. The Ron Howard film version of the children's perennial has horror-movie limbs that spring up independently of Seussian intent, the most extended of them going by the name of Jim Carrey, who wants to be the only Grinch remembered and marks his territory with piss and vinegar. Then there are the subversive asides, reckless stabs at hipping up a classic story that hadn't fallen out of fashion in the first place. So miscast as a director, Howard is guilty of trying too hard; so well-cast in the lead role, Carrey is also guilty of trying too hard--or maybe not hard enough. Improvising ten topical jokes to every five that succeed while smothered by a fuzzy-wuzzy bodysuit, Carrey suggests a green Robin Williams in maximum sellout mode. RUNNING TIME 105 minutes MPAA PG ASPECT RATIO(S) 1.85:1 (16x9-enhanced) (Collector's Edition) 1.33:1 (Playset) LANGUAGES English DD 5.1 English DTS 5.1 French DD...Bill ChambersBad Santa (2003) [The Unrated Version and Director's Cut] - Blu-ray Disctag:typepad.com,2003:post-6a0168ea36d6b2970c017c348dad91970b2012-12-12T21:01:42-05:002012-12-12T19:40:41-05:00a.k.a. Badder Santa (The Unrated Version) */**** Image B Sound A- Extras B Bad Santa (Director's Cut) **/**** Image B+ Sound A- Extras B starring Billy Bob Thornton, Tony Cox, Lauren Graham, John Ritter screenplay by Glenn Ficarra & John Requa directed by Terry Zwigoff by Walter Chaw With a premise and producing credit for the Coen Brothers and direction by Ghost World's Terry Zwigoff, the film with the best pedigree of the season is Bad Santa, making its failure particularly depressing. Its tale of ace safecracker and dangerous drunk Willie (Billy Bob Thornton), brought on board an annual mall Santa scam by criminal mastermind Marcus (Tony Cox), isn't all that inventive upon closer scrutiny, with Zwigoff's interest in the peculiarities of loneliness exhibiting themselves this time as caustic to no end and displeasingly bitter. Worse, there are two shots in the film that appear to be direct cribs of Coen Brothers shots--the first a crash zoom into an alarm clock, the second a collapse by Willie identical to a shot of Frances McDormand falling into bed in Blood Simple; what alarms isn't the instinct to borrow from innovative filmmakers, but rather the feeling of desperation that flashy camera movements...Bill ChambersThe Town (2010) - Blu-ray + DVD + Digital Copytag:typepad.com,2003:post-6a0168ea36d6b2970c017c31b83b82970b2012-09-07T20:18:33-05:002012-09-07T20:18:33-05:00***½/**** Image A- Sound A Extras B starring Ben Affleck, Jon Hamm, Rebecca Hall, Chris Cooper screenplay by Peter Craig and Ben Affleck & Aaron Stockard, based on the novel Prince of Thieves by Chuck Hogan directed by Ben Affleck by Walter Chaw If I'm still not entirely sold on Ben Affleck as an actor of depth, I'm completely sold on him as a director of depth. A director good enough, as it happens, to identify and avoid the actor's own weaknesses and augment his strengths, and to guide Affleck the actor to his best performance in a picture, The Town, that would be something like a revelation were Affleck's directorial debut, Gone Baby Gone, not so exceptional. Absolutely filthy with its story of place, count The Town as a tough-love love letter to Boston suburb Charlestown, a place established in the film as a breeding ground for bank robbers. Affleck plays Doug MacCray, the head of one such crew that also includes childhood buddy Jimmy (Jeremy Renner, excellent again) in an echo of the macho/familial dynamic established in the Aussie bank robber drama Animal Kingdom. More about the ties that bind men to a place and an idea of...Bill ChambersSpy Game (2001) [Collector's Edition (Widescreen)] - DVDtag:typepad.com,2003:post-6a0168ea36d6b2970c01774452956d970d2012-08-24T19:52:46-05:002012-08-24T19:52:46-05:00**/**** Image A+ Sound A+ Extras B+ starring Robert Redford, Brad Pitt, Catherine McCormack, Stephen Dillane screenplay by Michael Frost Beckner and David Arata directed by Tony Scott by Walter Chaw The defining moment of Spy Game, Tony Scott's latest exercise in stylistic excess, occurs at about the midway point. Playing CIA spymaster Nathan Muir, Robert Redford debriefs his best agent Tom Bishop (Brad Pitt) atop a building in Cold War Berlin. After a tense exchange, an enraged Bishop throws his chair off the barren, windswept rooftop. The problem with the scene is neither the preposterous screenplay by Michael Frost Beckner and David Arata to which it belongs, nor Scott's infatuation with the panoramic aerial shot, nor the way that Harry Gregson-Williams's ubiquitous score threatens here and at every other moment to rupture your eardrums. It's not even in the ridiculously out-of-place imagistic Xerox of Wings of Desire, Wim Wenders's melancholy ode to love and Berlin. RUNNING TIME 127 minutes MPAA PG-13 ASPECT RATIO(S) 2.35:1 (16x9-enhanced) LANGUAGES English DD 5.1 English DTS 5.1 French DD 5.1 CC No SUBTITLES English SDH Spanish REGION 1 DISC TYPE DVD-9 STUDIO Universal Buy This at Allposters.com No, the problem with the scene is...Bill ChambersThe Taking of Pelham 1 2 3 (2009)tag:typepad.com,2003:post-6a0168ea36d6b2970c017c3174f551970b2012-08-24T19:06:23-05:002012-08-24T19:07:02-05:00ZERO STARS/**** starring Denzel Washington, John Travolta, John Turturro, James Gandolfini screenplay by Brian Helgeland, based on the novel by John Godey directed by Tony Scott by Walter Chaw It's amazing that a film that takes place on a metal tube in a dank tunnel should have no trace of come in it. Less amazing when one considers that it's Tony Scott at the helm of this redux--the same Tony Scott who arguably reached the zenith of his potential with his vampire-erotica cult debut The Hunger, whose best film is the result of a superior screenplay by Quentin Tarantino (True Romance), and whose main claim to fame may be that he's behind one of the most homoerotic sequences ever captured on film in his gay amusement park Top Gun. Scott's The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3 (hereafter Pelham) is packed to the gills with meaningless, hyperactive visual gawping every bit as bad here as it is in his unwatchable Domino, so frantic that it has the opposite effect on the audience by rendering itself static and boring. (There's a lot going on in a screen full of snow, too, but all it does is put you to sleep.) The...Bill ChambersCatch Me If You Can (2002)tag:typepad.com,2003:post-6a0168ea36d6b2970c016769596e8f970b2012-08-18T10:13:35-05:002012-08-18T10:13:35-05:00****/**** starring Leonardo DiCaprio, Tom Hanks, Christopher Walken, Jennifer Garner screenplay by Jeff Nathanson, based on the book by Frank W. Abagnale and Stan Redding directed by Steven Spielberg by Walter Chaw There's an old Ray Bradbury story from 1948 called "Touch and Go" (since reprinted as "The Fruit at the Bottom of the Bowl") that tells the tale of a burglar who surprises the homeowner in his house and accidentally kills him. Erasing his fingerprints from a few surfaces, the burglar panics and starts wiping objects in rooms he hadn't visited and items, such as the fruit at the bottom of a bowl, he could not have handled. When the police find him hours later, he's in the attic polishing old silverware. Like Bradbury's thief, Spielberg is getting away with murder in most of his films post-Close Encounters of the Third Kind (particularly A.I., Minority Report, Schindler's List, Empire of the Sun, and Saving Private Ryan) until self-doubt and paranoia consume him, seducing him to a fatal eleventh-hour appeal. Spielberg is the bad test-taker, changing his answers to damn his instincts. Buy This at Allposters.com Desperate to be taken seriously as an adult filmmaker, he submarines his strengths (the...Bill ChambersOcean's Twelve (2004) [Widescreen Edition] - DVDtag:typepad.com,2003:post-6a0168ea36d6b2970c017742bde3be970d2012-06-26T13:43:09-05:002012-06-26T13:43:09-05:00**/**** Image A- Sound B+ starring George Clooney, Brad Pitt, Matt Damon, Catherine Zeta-Jones screenplay by George Nolfi directed by Steven Soderbergh by Walter Chaw It's all so very beautiful that it's easy to be seduced by it. The people, of course, are gorgeous. The locations in Amsterdam and Lake Como, Italy are gorgeous. The soundtrack? Gorgeous. Cinematography, direction: gorgeous, gorgeous. None too pretty, though, is that sniffy feeling of crashing a party where you stick out like a sore thumb--where everybody knows everybody else and you keep asking the wrong questions. In that, at least, Steven Soderbergh's Ocean's Twelve is more faithful to the Rat Packer Ocean's Eleven than his own remake of the same--this picture's prequel--was. Ocean's Twelve amounts to a martini-and-lounge party at which everybody's having a really great time as you watch from your chair in the corner, daydreaming of looking like Julia Roberts, talking like brandy in a warm snifter, having more fame than The Beatles, and being richer than God. Buy at Amazon USA Buy at Amazon Canada RUNNING TIME 125 minutes MPAA PG-13 ASPECT RATIO(S) 2.35:1, 16x9-enhanced LANGUAGES English DD 5.1 English Dolby Surround French DD 5.1 SUBTITLES English French Spanish CC Yes...Bill ChambersOcean's Eleven (2001) [Widescreen Edition] - DVDtag:typepad.com,2003:post-6a0168ea36d6b2970c017742bdbae9970d2012-06-26T13:11:17-05:002012-06-26T13:11:17-05:00**½/**** Image A- Sound A- Extras B starring George Clooney, Matt Damon, Andy Garcia, Brad Pitt screenplay by Ted Griffin directed by Steven Soderbergh by Walter Chaw Impeccably-costumed and impossibly-handsome action figures are arranged in cool poses throughout Ocean's Eleven, Steven Soderbergh's updating of the same-named Rat Pack caper. A throwback to the star-driven cinema of the Fifties and a reflection of our own fanatical interest in cults of personality, the film features transparent performances (with the exception of Don Cheadle, each performer in Ocean's Eleven is playing his- or herself), and the same kind of sadistic voyeurism that impels us to simultaneously deify and find fault with our favourite actors keeps our peepers glued to the screen as George Clooney, Brad Pitt, Matt Damon, Elliot Gould, and Carl Reiner revolve around one another in a loose heist intrigue intended to relieve Andy Garcia of both his millions and his girlfriend. Buy at Amazon USA Buy at Amazon Canada RUNNING TIME 117 minutes MPAA PG-13 ASPECT RATIO(S) 2.35:1, 16x9-enhanced LANGUAGES English DD 5.1 English Dolby Surround French DD 5.1 SUBTITLES English French Spanish CC Yes REGION 1 DISC TYPE DVD-9 STUDIO Warner Buy This at Allposters.com Less than a week...Bill ChambersMachine Gun McCain (1969) - Blu-ray Disctag:typepad.com,2003:post-6a0168ea36d6b2970c0167675b55e0970b2012-06-11T11:25:44-05:002012-06-11T11:26:08-05:00**½/**** Image A- Sound A- Extras B starring John Cassavetes, Britt Ekland, Peter Falk, Gena Rowlands screenplay by Mino Roli, based on the novel Captive City by Ovid Demaris directed by Giuliano Montaldo by Bryant Frazer Tough, simple, and bereft of nonsense, Machine Gun McCain is the bare quintessence of the crime movie. Bound to and thus defined by its generic elements--the ex-convict on the make, the gangster's moll, the double-cross, the triple-cross, and the shadowy mob bosses pulling the strings--it takes a basic but unpretentiously stylish formal approach that makes the most of several terrific performances at the film's core. Buy at Amazon USA Buy at Amazon Canada RUNNING TIME 96 minutes MPAA Not Rated ASPECT RATIO(S) 2.35:1 (1080p/MPEG-4) LANGUAGES English 1.0 DTS-HD MA SUBTITLES English SDH French Spanish REGION A DISC TYPE BD-25 STUDIO Blue Underground And, God, what a cast! In the title role, John Cassavetes chews his way through a scenario that begins with his release from San Quentin and progresses quickly through a betrayal that turns into a revenge plot and finally a Mafia manhunt. McCain takes a wife, Irene (Britt Ekland), whom he poaches from two strangers in a nightclub, and rebukes his own...Bill ChambersVantage Point (2008) - Blu-ray Disctag:typepad.com,2003:post-6a0168ea36d6b2970c0168ec019917970c2012-06-01T20:03:40-05:002012-06-01T20:03:40-05:00*/**** Image A Sound A Extras C+ starring Dennis Quaid, Matthew Fox, Forest Whitaker, William Hurt screenplay by Barry L. Levy directed by Pete Travis by Bryant Frazer If Vantage Point is an experiment, it can be pretty much considered a failure. The unconventional strategy here is to construct a narrative feature by taking multiple passes at the same 20 minutes or so in a very bad day for Secret Service agent Thomas Barnes (Dennis Quaid). Barnes took a bullet for the President of the United States a year ago and has been scheduled to return to duty by working the security detail for the PotUS's speech at an anti-terrorist summit in Salamanca, Spain. And before he can speak, President Ashton (William Hurt) is nailed by an assassin's bullet--or is he? Buy at Amazon USA Buy at Amazon Canada RUNNING TIME 90 minutes MPAA PG-13 ASPECT RATIO(S) 2.40:1 (1080p/MPEG-4) LANGUAGES English 5.1 Dolby TrueHD French DD 5.1 Spanish DD 5.1 Portuguese DD 5.1 Thai DD 5.1 SUBTITLES English English SDH French Spanish Portuguese Chinese (Traditional) Chinese (Simplified) Korean Thai REGION All DISC TYPE BD-50 STUDIO Sony Buy This at Allposters.com The film replays the moments leading up to and following...Bill ChambersMatchstick Men (2003) [Widescreen Edition] - DVDtag:typepad.com,2003:post-6a0168ea36d6b2970c016305fd7bf4970d2012-05-30T19:02:46-05:002012-05-30T19:02:46-05:00**/**** Image B+ Sound B+ Extras B+ starring Nicolas Cage, Sam Rockwell, Alison Lohman, Bruce McGill screenplay by Nicholas Griffin & Ted Griffin, based on the novel by Eric Garcia directed by Ridley Scott by Walter Chaw The defining Nicolas Cage performance is still the one he delivered in Vampire's Kiss, an indescribably strange film that saw the actor affecting some sort of Algonquin accent and, in the picture's most memorable scene, screaming at his therapist while wearing an ill-fitting set of plastic fangs. For Ridley Scott's highly-anticipated take on the dead-on-its-feet big con formula Matchstick Men (one last score for the grizzled shyster, a young apprentice who's not what he seems, an unexpected and unwise late partner in crime, a big twist telegraphed from the first frame, and so on), Cage seems to have resurrected his perversely hammy turn in that underseen camp classic: screaming at another therapist (Bruce Altman, always good), donning another disguise with an astonishing number of distracting tics and affectations, and ultimately accepting his fate with a sort of fatigued, fatalistic resignation. Buy at Amazon USA Buy at Amazon Canada RUNNING TIME 116 minutes MPAA R ASPECT RATIO(S) 2.35:1, 16x9-enhanced LANGUAGES English DD 5.1 French...Bill Chambers